The
Myrddraal drew its black sword slowly, silently, stepping forwards to
face the black-coated man. Its eyeless face was shrouded in the
shadows beneath its hood as it rasped. "A black coat cannot save
you, mortal."

The
black-coated man looked up distractedly, toying with a small flame
that danced on his fingertips. "Oh, I'm sorry," he said. "I
can't hear you over the sound of how awesome I am."

The
Myrddraal took another step forwards. "Your pathetic 'awesome'
is nothing next to the glories of the Great Lord of the Dark," it
said, raising its sword.

"What?"
said the black-coated man. "I'm sorry, but this flame is really
cool. Look at all the little swirly bits in it, and the flickery
bits, and the burny bits." He held out his hand. "Isn't it
cool?"

By now,
the Myrddraal was growing more than a little frustrated.

"I mean,
just look at it. I wonder what will happen if I make it
bigger?" The flame suddenly expanded into a huge ball of raging
fire, the heat making the small room feel like a furnace. "Wow, ok,
maybe a bit smaller than that." The fireball shrunk. Slightly.

"Stop
this toying, mortal," grated the Myrddraal. "It is time for you
to die."

"What?
Really?" said the man. "Damn, looks like I'll have to be
super-awesome again to get out of this."

"Silence,"
said the Myrddraal, moving in, sword ready.

"I mean,
stuff always ends up getting broken when I do that," babbled the
man. "Shoddy buildings can't even contain the awesome levels of
my awesomeness. Is it too much to ask for a destruction-proof
building?"

"Silence."

"Actually,
I could probably make one of those. Yeah, if I make a
destruction-proof building, I can sell it to everyone else for loads
and loads of money! I'll be a frickin' millionaire! Oh,
now that's a plan!"

"SILENCE,
I SAID!"

"I could
be bigger than the guy who invented swords!" cackled the man. "I
could retire to some island, and hire the Dragon Reborn to come be my
servant! Hehe; 'here you go, Mr Reborn, go and clean my kecks. And
then fetch me a beer. And then break the world!'. Oh, no, wait,
can't do that last one. I'm not supposed to break the
world. I'm sure that's what they said…"

"I WILL
NOT WAIT! DO I HAVE TO TALK LIKE THE GREAT LORD OF THE DARK JUST TO
GET YOUR ATTENTIONM, DAMMIT? I'M THE ONE TRYING TO KILL
YOU!"

"Now
that's not very composed, is it?" said the man. "Aren't you
supposed to be more the 'silent and badass' type of baddie,
rather than the 'flaming mental' variety?"

The
Myrddraal took several deep breaths. "Never – never – in
all my years as a degenerate outcast offspring of a degenerate
monster of darkness, have I ever had to shout at someone to let him
know I was about to kill him. Are you completely insane?"

"Completely,"
nodded the man. "Taim said so, when he set the others after me. I
think they wanted to kill me, you know."

The
Myrddraal didn't quite know what to say to that. So instead, it
went back to plan A. "Prepare to die," it said.

"-but I
showed them, didn't I? Shouldn't teach insane people to Travel,
not if you want to catch them and kill th- what? Die?" The man
looked a bit shocked. "No, that won't be very nice at all. I
mean, why do you want to do that? Won't it hurt?"

"You
oppose my Master," the Myrddraal said. "And so you must die."

The man
brightened, as if he had just had a revelation. "Oh, you want me
to die! Well, that makes a lot more sense. Wait, hold on a
minute, though, doesn't that mean you'll have to stab me with
that sword?"

"Yes,"
said the Myrddraal, the relish in its tone turning to complete
bafflement when it raised its sword again. It had somehow turned into
a haddock. A very long, very thin, very black, haddock.

The man
clapped his hands over his mouth like a child, trying
(unsuccessfully) to hold back laughter. "Go on then," he laughed.
"Stab me!"

The
Myrddraal took a long look at his new haddock-sword, and stabbed him.

The
Myrddraal grated its teeth, and twisted the haddock-sword. "You've
got a Thakan'dar-wrought haddock embedded in your stomach. Why
aren't you dying in agony?"

"Fishy
fishy fishy! Fishy fishy- what? Oh, the dead thing. Serious now, is
it? Okay, I can do serious. Honest. Trust me, this one time, we had
to-"

"Shut up
and die!"

"And
then we all- shut up and die? No, that's not how it went. Oh, hey,
I've just realised, I've got a haddock in me and I'm fine. How
awesome is that? I must be made of solidified awesome or
something. Wow, imagine that; solidified awesome. I could just get a
big block of it and stuff it down my-"

"Oh,
forget it. Someone else can kill him." The Myrddraal sighed, and
turned away, heading for the door. He left the haddock-sword in the
man.

"Hey,
wait, did you want to have some kind of awesome fight or something?"
said the man. He pulled the haddock-sword out of himself and threw it
to the Myrddraal. On the way, it became an awesome looking sword,
with sharp, wavy edges and spikes sticking out of it all over the
place.

The
Myddraal caught it. "So… I can kill you?" it said tentatively.

"Yup,"
said the man, producing an axe made of pure lighting from thin air.
"I suppose you'll be wanting to attack, or something?"

"Finally,"
sighed the Myrddraal, and then attacked. It swung an awesome swing at
the man, but the lighting-axe was there like… well, lighting, to
block it.

The two
settled in to a fight of such unspeakable awesome that it cannot be
described. There were huge flashes of light that went Freeeeem!
and massive exploding explosions that went all Kgghhhraaarrggghhh!
and stuff smashing into little pieces like Smash! and rings of
fire that were all Ghhgrroooaarr! and large animals jumping
through said rings of fire (and they were all like Moooo!) and
stuff like that.

When they
were done, there was very little left of the room. Or, indeed, the
entire town. The man stood holding his lighting-axe, and the
Myrddraal stood holding its awesome sword, and they both just looked
at each other. Not just any ordinary look, though, this was the
'smouldering rivalry' look that goodies and baddies always do
when they ever have a final showdown. I think it's in the law or
something. You know, the look where you can practically see the
sparks jumping between them.

Heh,
funny," said the man.

"What?"
said the Myddraal, gathering itself.

"Your
cloak's moving."

"WHAT?"
yelled the Myddraal, spinning around to try and see. "I paid good
money for this weighted cloak! How dare it fail now! I'm
going to- Gghurk!"

It didn't
mean to say 'Gghurk'. It said 'Gghurk' because the man had
taken the opportunity to walk over and axe it in the head.

"Hah
hah, I win. I win and you're dead!" said the man. "Now, where
was I? Oh yeah, the fish. No, wait, not the fish. It was something
about Taim. Or was it fire? Maybe if I go to… Arafel. Yes, Arafel.
They wear bells on their heads. They must know what I was
thinking about."

And so,
babbling in his demented version of logic, the man opened a Traveling
gate and stepped through…

The author would like to thank you for your continued support. Your review has been posted.